THE WORKINGMEN'S LEAGUE 213
expected the movement to produce jobs and financial prosperity
for them and were bitterly disappointed to find that the constitu
tion specialized not in jobs but in principles.
Early in March, 1853, the German workers of New York tried
to capitalize on the arrival of August Willich to infuse new life
into their radical movement. Weitling had known Willich in Eu
rope. He was a Forty-eighter, a fellow refugee, and an ardent
radical who like himself had become an opponent of Marx. At a
huge banquet in Shakespeare Hall, where at least 350 people were
seated at tables in a hall decorated with red flags and the triangle
that symbolized Weitling's movement, Willich addressed his fel
low radicals in an eloquent and revolutionary speech on the theme
that bread was more essential than liberty. Weitling, in the main
address of the evening, declared that "Communism alone is the
alpha and omega for the redemption of a suffering humanity," "the
gospel of the poor and the oppressed, for whom a prophet, de
serted by his people, had been crucified on Golgotha." Turning
to Willich, who wore a bright red scarf across his breast, Weitling
presented him with an enormous secondhand sword in the name
of the workers of New York, reminded him that Christ had come
to bring not peace but a sword and urged the newly arrived com
rade to make good use of this new symbol of power and leadership
"in the holy battle for the finest treasures of mankind."
The celebration was a very successful and happy occasion. A
collection was raised for the relief of fellow communists in the
jails of Cologne and Paris, and a youngster recited Weitling's
poem about the "little communist." When the formal program
ended shortly after midnight, the celebrators adjourned to the
hall of the Arbeiterbund, where they danced until dawn. The oc
casion, however, did not give the Arbeiterbund the stimulus which
had been expected. The New York Demokrat ignored the event
altogether, and the Abendzeitung gave it only four lines. The New
Yorker Staatszeitung ridiculed "Brother Weitling's speech about
Jesus Christ, the first proletarian" in its account of the comic-
opera presentation of the sword to Willich, who looked "like King
barré
(Barré)
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